PIGEON FORGE, Tenn.—Tom and Barb Hansen’s search for a retirement spot reads like the script to a road movie. California’s Lake Tahoe. Sedona and Scottsdale in Arizona. The Ozark Mountains of Missouri. Myrtle Beach, S.C.
Over a decade or so, the couple traveled the country to imagine life after Mr. Hansen retired as president of a community bank in the suburbs west of Chicago. In 2018, the Hansens, ages 61 and 60, picked rural Sevier County, Tenn.
